Reel Tails by Emerson Cannon, President

Size: px

Start display at page:

Download "Reel Tails by Emerson Cannon, President"

Edwina Fitzgerald
5 years ago
Views:

1 Volume 20 Issue 3 Periodical Newsletter of the Dame Juliana League Fall 2014 Reel Tails by Emerson Cannon, President Here it is the start of another DJL year. We have a full slate of programs for the year. We will be holding a casting clinic led by IFFF Certified Casting Instructor Mike Costello next year, our Annual Learn to Fly Fish Course next April, nature, carp fishing, wet fly fishing and several other interesting and informative presentations. Just try and make it the last Monday of the month at Kimberton Fire Company. Look for your green card with the calendar on it which should have come in the mail in September. You can also go to the website. Hope your summer was filled with fishing. I had a fairly busy summer. I traveled to Maine with club member Jim Shaughnessy and two other friends to fish at Weatherby s for smallmouth bass and land-locked salmon. The fishing was not as good as the other 35 years we have gone yes it was our 36th straight year. We caught fish but needed to battle all day long down pours. It sort of takes the fun away to fish at night...in the rain after fishing all day in the rain. Oh well.we managed to get some OK smallmouths and some decent landlocked salmon. I was using a small olive and white marabou streamer with club member Jim Matson s pulse disc in front for the salmon and a popper for the bass. Both flies really worked well! I went to North Carolina for a week and went fishing for sharks and cobia and really got lucky. While fishing with Brian Fall 2014 Meeting Schedule Meetings are held at the Kimberton Fire Co. Fairgrounds Meeting Hall. Doors open at 7:15 PM. Meeting begins at 7:30PM. October 28 (Monday) Featuring our own Mike Ferraro Fly Fishing for Stripers in the Surf November 24 (Monday) Featuring Holly Merker Birds Along the Streambank December 29 (Monday) Featuring the League s expert fly tyers Fly Tying Roundup Fly tying equipment, materials and instruction will be provided to all members who want to learn this craft djlffpa@gmail.com to sign-up. Meetings are open to the public so bring a friend Horsley, who has spoken at the club, we found a tide line and managed to catch a lot of cobia along with a few sharks. The largest cobia was 50 lbs. It ate an orange shark fly and took forever to get to the boat. Those fish do not quit fighting. The fish pictured is about 30 lbs. Most of the cobia were eating a yellow bunny strip fly that had a red head. They could not get enough of this fly. I had another fly on for a bit and the cobia would reject mine and go right to Brian s. I quickly changed and we had a number of cobia doubles. This was a perfect day for us. The temperature was about 80, we had about a 3 mph wind blowing us right down the tide line and tons of fish in that tide line willing to eat. We were 19 miles from the inlet and saw no boats all day as soon as we left the inlet. After coming home I had to get ready to go to Alaska to fish for pike. A trophy pike is said to be over 40, while a fish over 45 is very special. There were six of us staying on the houseboat. Four were in my group and the other two were accomplished anglers from Holland. They used spin casting rods as well as fly rods. We gave them some flies and they had big success. The largest fish we got was 48 with a number of 47 and 46 fish. These fish ate flies that were small..about 8 and larger ones about 14. Pike are ferocious eaters the strike is amazing. You must really be careful as they have 702 teeth in each mouth. A 40 pike is said to be 20 years old with each additional inch giving it another year in age. This place along the Yukon is as good a pike fishery as anywhere in the world. Well now it is reality time as I will be taking out the 2-weight to try and fold some Valley Creek browns. The 2-weight really is a nice match for these fish as their fight relative to their size is superb. Hope you have some great fall fishing!

Page 2 Favorite Fly Patterns: Tying Matt Minch s Golden

is authored by a friend of mine of 28 years, Matt Minch,

more or less retired trout bum in Gardiner, Montana.

Materials: Hook: #8-12, xl up to3xl, Barbless if for

chickabou Abdomen: Brown-Olive short flash chenille

hook size) Step 1 (above): Place bead on hook behind eye,

chenille forward Step 2 (above): Tie in tail of

3 (above): Tie on abdomen of brown-olive short-flash

Step 7 (below): Tie in dubbing of antique gold squirrel

2 Page 2 Favorite Fly Patterns: Tying Matt Minch s Golden Stonefly Nymph from Bob Ballantyne This great fly pattern is authored by a friend of mine of 28 years, Matt Minch, West Chester STC grad in the 1950s, former Pennsylvanian, more or less retired trout bum in Gardiner, Montana. One helluva fly! Materials: Hook: #8-12, xl up to3xl, Barbless if for Yellowstone NP Bead: 5/32 or 1/8 gold Wire: Optional;.010 to.025 lead free Thread: Light brown Tail: Golden brown chickabou Abdomen: Brown-Olive short flash chenille Hackle: Light brown-dyed grizzly saddle (undersized for hook size) Step 1 (above): Place bead on hook behind eye, add underbody of wire if desired Step 4 (below): Wrap chenille forward Step 2 (above): Tie in tail of golden-brown chickabou Step 5 (below): Select hackle Step 3 (above): Tie on abdomen of brown-olive short-flash chenille Step 6 (below): Tie in hackle at half way point Step 7 (below): Tie in dubbing of antique gold squirrel blend Step 8 (below): Wrap dubbing one turn behind the hackle Step 9 (below): Wrap dubbing forward to bead Step 10 (below): Wrap hackle forward and tie off Step 11 (below): Finished fly

Page 3 Project Healing Waters from Mike Ferraro A Word About Dues and Insurance by Emerson Cannon, President Project Healing Waters (PHW) is a national program that is dedicated to the physical and

3 Page 3 Project Healing Waters from Mike Ferraro A Word About Dues and Insurance by Emerson Cannon, President Project Healing Waters (PHW) is a national program that is dedicated to the physical and emotional rehabilitation of disabled active service personnel and vets through fly fishing. For the past 18 months, Valley Forge Trout Unlimited has sponsored an inpatient program at the VA Medical Center in Coatesville. Volunteers meet with patients every Wednesday to tie flies, practice casting and talk about fishing. This usually takes place at one of the buildings at the hospital, but this spring and into summer we were able to partner with Children's Country Week Association (CCWA) to hold a weekly fishing clinic at the pond at Paradise Farm Camp. Patients were bussed to camp from the hospital for an evening of bass and bluegill fishing. This October an additional effort will begin that will focus on mentoring outpatients in our area. Meetings will be held every Monday night at the West Bradford Fire Hall for tying and casting. In addition to volunteers from VFTU, members of Dame Juliana League, Brandywine Trout Club and West Chester Fish, Game and Wildlife also regularly attend the sessions. This past September PHW-CCWA organized a picnic for the vets at Paradise Farms Camp. The evening started at 6 PM sharp with the arrival of our friends from Coatesville s VA. We planned on twenty-five guests and PHW/VFTU recruited 25 volunteers to be buddies for the attendees from the VA.. The emphasis of the evening was fun and camaraderie with some games/contests associated with fly fishing. Dinner was prepared by PVF s Caterer, Kevin Bruton. Guests departed at 9:15 PM. For more information on this program and to see how you can volunteer check see Dues Increasing Our dues of $15 per member and $20 per family have been constant since the mid-90 s. In the 90 s $15 went a wee bit further than in We are just scraping by with insurance costs increasing, speaker costs increasing and the odds and ends increasing..one problem is we have more odds than ends. Consequently we must raise our dues. Our new structure will be $20 per year per member and $25 per year per family. We know that this is a pain but unfortunately our record of no increases in almost 20 years needs to end. Hopefully, the next increase will take us into the 2070 s to keep up with the 20 year pattern of dues increase. Thank you! Insurance In todays sue happy population just having people meet, help out with stocking, teaching fly fishing, helping with collecting money at the Kimberton Fair and having a fly casting component have forced our insurance company to mandate a liability waiver. We all know that this is a pain, really does not accomplish much but the insurance companies say it is mandatory. So, we are asking all members to please sign one of these waivers when you come to an activity. The waivers last for our yearly term. You need only to sign once a year that covers all activities for that year. That is Sept 2014 through August If you have ever been involved with a school trip either organizing one or having a child attend one, you know the drill. This says that our club and the insurance company is covered if someone were to sue us or the insurance company for their injury caused at an event or sue us or the insurance company for damage that a club member might cause during an event. The injury or damage is not covered. That coverage is still on the person that was injured or caused the damage. This all seems to be a pain, but no organization will let us meet (Kimberton Fire Company), use their facilities (YMCA, PA Fish Commission and stocking or the park where the casting clinic is held) unless we have proof of insurance. So.if you wish to attend or participate, you must sign the waiver saying you will not sue us. The irony is that you still can sue us but with the waiver saying you will not, it just might help us a bit.in a court of law. So bottom line: At each meeting we will have the forms to sign. All you need to do is print your name, sign and date. Then we must keep these on file for 5 years and you must do a new one each year! So this is a one-time deal each year. Remember the good ole days when people would just meet and help and teach people for fun and were not afraid of law suits and everything was easy! Those are the good ole days and this waiver business is today! So, even though all you might do is walk in the door to hear a speaker and leave and verbally promise not to sue us, you still must sign the waiver. Please don t complain to us, we are merely the messengers. Thanks for your understanding

4 Page 4 Emerson s Fishing Pics Emerson Cannon, our President, sent me these pics from his many travels around the globe. I think the trout come from Valley Creek. The Northern Pike, bass, houseboat and sunset pics are from an unnamed, secret location deep in Canada. If you have pictures you would like to share in future newsletters send them to me. They will be published. -Bob Molzahn, Editor ARTICLES/PICS WANTED!! The next edition of is due out in January, If you would like to write an article, story, share a fly pattern or picture or write a poem please do so and send it by December 31, 2014 to Bob Molzahn at rfm1949@comcast.net.

Page 5 Dame Juliana League Fly Fishers P.O.

net Dame Juliana League Fly Fishers is an affiliated member club of the Federation of Fly Fishers Visit our website at www.djlflyfishers.

5 Page 5 Dame Juliana League Fly Fishers P.O. Box 178 Kimberton, PA Officers and Board of Directors President Emerson Cannon Vice President Vacant Secretary John Burgos Treasurer Bob Molzahn Membership- Mike Ferraro Sponsor Relations- Joe King Fly Fishing Course/Newsletter- Bob Molzahn Outreach- Ted Nawalinski Website- Tim King Board Members- Dick Allebach, Troy Dunn, Joe Vasile, Bob Moser Jr., Ed Nugent, Jerry Sizemore Member dues per calendar year are $20-Individual, $25-Family. For new members please add $5. Newsletter Editor- Bob Molzahn Printed copies by KD Press ( Articles, news, and fly tying tips are gratefully accepted. Please send them to rfm1949@comcast.net Dame Juliana League Fly Fishers is an affiliated member club of the Federation of Fly Fishers Visit our website at Send comments, inquiries and address changes to djlffpa@gmail.com ORVIS DOWNINGTOWN BRANDYWINE SQUARE SHOPPING CENTER 70 QUARRY ROAD, UNIT K (Just Rt. 30) DOWNINGTOWN, PA Over 10,000 Flies Extensive Selection Of Fly Rods, Reels, And Lines Fly Tying Materials And Supplies Casting Lessons And Trips Available Tel/ Fax/ A SportingTradition Since 1856

Riffles & Runs by John Burgos, President. Winter-Spring 2018 Meeting & Event Calendar

Riffles & Runs by John Burgos, President. Winter-Spring 2018 Meeting & Event Calendar Volume 24 Issue 1 Periodical Newsletter of the Dame Juliana League Winter 2018 New Year greetings to all our members! As I write this article, we are currently in the coldest spell of the winter (so far).